The Dead Revolutionaries Club
by 1boo
Summary: Grenoble, tucked away in the mountains near the Italian border, is a good city for crime and tourism. Somehow it becomes the birthplace of a group of left-wing extremists. This is mostly Enjolras's fault. (Barricade boys modern!AU, rule 63, eventual e/r)


Grantaire met Enjolras in the nighttime, after the buses all stopped and the D tram no longer made an effort to venture into the neighborhood called Saint Martin D'Heres. Grantaire had a bottle of gin in one hand, because he respected the late-night tradition of street-drinking in Grenoble, and a black marker in the other. When he'd left the apartment he'd thought of maybe doodling on a few shop windows or bus stations, but he'd been out for hours now and had added nothing of his own, anywhere. He was adrift, had enough gin in his belly to pretend he didn't exist, and preferred to keep it that way. To draw something of his own would ruin his illusion.

This was a Sunday, one week into one of his black moods. Even if Grantaire was still himself, tiny and weak in the center of it all, a black mood would envelop him, and spit him out when it chose.

He stood in front of and apartment complex, considering this. The wall he faced was mostly bare, with only the favorite tag line: a cursive sprawl of **_Libre?_**

The woman called Enjolras came towards him along the well-lit curve of the tram tracks, which were set in the pavement parallel to the street. She did not know that Grantaire was along her path – along it but not in it, like a pebble kicked into the underbrush. She walked straight along smooth metal, the tracks that to her were efficiency and city planning, and to Grantaire were urban ley lines and someone else's ball of string in the labyrinth. Her pace was quick without hurrying. Grantaire stopped to watch her for a moment from his shadowy wall.

A man and woman on bikes came along the tram tracks from the opposite direction, heading out of Saint Martin D'Heres and towards Grenoble city proper, where even from here Grantaire could see the Bastille lit up blue on the side of the mountain. The two bicyclists steered expertly out of the path of Enjolras's boots, each with one hand on their handlebars and the other wrapped around the neck of a bottle of wine. Grantaire watched them break on the rock that was Enjolras.

He was very drunk. The world was a sliding haze of lights on a black background, and the stranger, Enjolras, with her steady course, was glorious.

Even if Enjolras didn't bother to break stride as the bikers passed, her eyes still followed them instinctually. This was the only reason she noticed Grantaire, who she'd already passed by. Grantaire, who was standing with a marker in his hand in front of a graffitied wall.

If he'd had any sense, he would have used the moment it took her eyes to adjust from the glare of the lit-up tram tracks to stick the goddamn marker in his pocket and pretend to be a harmless drunk pissing on the wall. No one decided further inspection was needed of a man pissing on a wall. Grantaire knew _some_ things.

But he wasn't thinking – not a surprise, he thought ruefully – so she walked right up to him, met his gaze, and said, "You should come to one of our meetings."

This didn't really compute very fast. In part this was because, as she spoke, Grantaire's brain was madly remembering everything he knew about fines and criminal records and Grenoble had notoriously liberal police, right? And maybe she'd feel better if she got to shout at him a little. He could let her shout. Not a problem.

She didn't shout. She grabbed his wrist, touching his sleeve but no skin, and thrust a piece of paper in his hand. It was smooth, like a magazine page. Semi-gloss paper, something sluggish in the back of Grantaire's mind reminded him. For when you want the vibrancy of glossy paper but the resistance to glare of matte.

"Okay," Grantaire said, because he was drunk and it was late and this woman's hair was blonde and cut at her collarbone in wisps like razors. "Sure."

He bowed, sloppy, and she flinched away. It was not a fearful flinch; it might've been a disgusted one. She hadn't realized that he was drunk, he thought. He laughed.

"Are you alright?" she asked, as if she didn't know the rules of what was best left alone. "Monsieur…?"

He realized, through the haze of gin, through the strangling hands of the black mood, that the nuance of her tone across the word monsieur had not been a continuation of her question, but an uncertainty; she wasn't sure if it was the correct address. He looked down at himself, but his clothes were all male, unless you counted the socks. He was confused. He was oddly relieved.

But still drunk, and still himself, so he slurred out, "I'm lovely. I'm Icarus enjoying the view."

And she withdrew.

Grantaire kept his eyes down as she left and tried to focus on the flyer still in his hand. He considered the possibility that he'd just been recruited for a cult. His wrist ached from the strength of her grip. He checked himself for his wallet with numb fingers, but found it easily enough.

The question of the age remained, however: what the fuck? Grantaire stumbled a little more into the light, trying vaguely to see if there was going to be any bruising on his wrist, laughing at himself for tripping over his own feet.

Once under the streetlights, though, he realized he could still see her, still walking in long strides down the center of the tram tracks. Artemis, he thought, watching her walk so purposefully away from him. Athena, Freya. That nymph Apollo chased for rape, who turned herself into a tree.

Grantaire was an art history student at UPMF, but Mythology was his last class of the week.

On the way home he lost the bottle of gin somehow, but Grantaire woke safely tangled in his own duvet at seven AM with shaking hands, and smoked three cigarettes in quick succession, barefoot on his skinny balcony. The sun was rising over the rough peaks of the Belledonne. He watched it, tired. The entirety of him felt gritty and stinging.

The gin he found after only a quick wander of the neighborhood, on a park bench next to a late night kebab shop. Grantaire snatched it up quickly, dodging the looks sent his way from the lady behind the counter of the _boulangerie_ across the street. He was pretty sure he once woke up in front of that bakery with a local beggar glaring down at him, about two seconds away from going through Grantaire's pockets. The owner obviously remembered him.

He snatched up the bottle and the crumpled paper lying next to it, and got the hell away.

By the time he'd climbed the four flights up to their apartment, Feuilly was awake and nursing a cup of coffee with a look of deep reverence. She looked about as haggard as Grantaire felt, but was decent and sane and would be quiet about it.

"Good morning!" Grantaire sang out in the best falsetto he could muster, because no one to date had ever accused Grantaire of being decent and sane and quiet, and there was really no point in breaking the trend now.

Feuilly didn't kick him in the ankle – she wasn't violent, but swift and inconspicuous kicks were a specialty of hers when she didn't feel like using her words – so she'd probably had enough coffee to put up with at least a little of his shit.

"Wasn't expecting you at the door," she said, frowning, her dark eyes tracking between Grantaire and closed door to his bedroom. It was the door marked with a large, glittery butterfly. Grantaire shrugged and held up the bottle of gin he'd been in the process of stuffing into his cabinet, the flyer half-crumpled behind it.

"Rescuing a fair maiden. Or gentlemaid. Gin's a masculine noun*, but shouldn't be beholden to gender constructs."

Feuilly wasn't looking at the gin, and didn't comment on gender constructs. She had a drawer in her room specifically for clothes she didn't mind Grantaire borrowing; that ship had sailed. She was staring instead at the flyer, which had fallen finally to the floor with Grantaire's grand gestures. Her face was doing something interesting, like maybe all the blood had drained from her face under her dark skin.

"Grantaire," she said slowly, "where did you get that?"

"Uh, a lady? Gave it to me? A bit blurry, really." He stooped and picked up the flyer, noting the headrush as he straightened – and shit, was it anemia again? Or maybe just the hangover. Please let it be the hangover.

"Wait, are you involved in the…this…?"

"It's a group. That I'm with, yeah." She continued to stare like aliens had landed in their kitchen. "And which I wasn't exactly going to mention."

Grantaire shrugged. "Keeping things from me? Alas, I find I don't give a shit, as you are a big girl now. But what exactly does your secret cult group…do? It's not exactly clear on the flyer, is it?" he asked, peering down at the paper with a frown. Most of the text was illegible, black on dark backgrounds, and someone had copy-pasted the logo for the French Socialist Party and a LGTBQIA logo over a photograph of the French flag that had been subjected to someone with a hard-on for the PS burn tool. "As far as I can tell, you're some very queer-friendly socialists. You may have also rejected all aesthetics."

Feuilly sighed, massaging her temples. She got up and grabbed a yogurt cup out of the fridge. "This is actually important to me, Grantaire," she said, licking the foil yogurt top.

Feuilly didn't really yell, or debate. Grantaire had learned that early on, so when she said something like that in her even, lyrical voice, he tried to listen.

"Okay, okay, just explain. Don't explain the photoshopping, though. I don't want to know."

He received another withering look. "Who did you say gave this to you?"

"A blonde lady, I think."

"You think she was blonde or you think she was a lady?" Feuilly asked, deadpan.

"Shut up, gender is not always essential, we all know this. I think she was blonde. And had a…uh, a red coat. And looked serious as fuck and kind of…shiny. Intense."

"Oh shit, you've actually _met_ Enjolras," Feuilly said, blanching. If it wasn't so funny Grantaire would be concerned.

"I have? I have," he decided. "It was suitably dramatic. Would've been more so if she'd actually tried to have me arrested, like I was expecting. Do we have any cereal?"

"Arrested?" Feuilly demanded, her face doing something funny. "Oh, god, she didn't get arrested, did she?"

"They would have only fined me, don't fret. Wait, does this lady get arrested _often_?"

"No, no, I am not talking to you about Enjolras. But what she gave you," Feuilly muttered, neatly stealing the flyer from his hands and peering at it, speaking more to herself than to Grantaire, "is a flyer advertising The Dead Revolutionaries Club." She paused, coming back to herself, and cracked a smile. "Oh, balls, I actually just used that name. Jean is rubbing off on me."

"I'm really not sure which, of all these new revelations, I should address first," Grantaire said, rubbing his face.

"Address nothing," Feuilly ordered, brandishing her spoon. "Stay out of it, oh my god."

"No no no, how could I ever?" he asked, riffling through the cupboards. Looking up and stretching his arms over his head was doing funny things to his vision. The anemia theory was gaining ground. "Who is Jean? Have you been out wooing, Feuilly my darling, my morning star?"

"How are you this chipper with a hangover?" Feuilly attempted to deflect.

Grantaire's smile became rather fixed. He wasn't feeling chipper. He was trying so fucking hard, and she went and brought attention to it. For a second he was very angry at Feuilly and wanted to rip the coffee out of her hands and throw it against the wall; God he could imagine it, the sound it would make the stain, the grim and horrible satisfaction. Then that passed and he blinked and was tired.

Something of this must have showed on his face.

"_Bon sang_, R. Just drink some coffee and I'll tell you about Jean's slam sonnets."

"I'm cutting back on coffee. What's a slam sonnet?"

"How should I know? I can't tell a sonnet from Mc Solaar lyrics, but I've heard he's invented his own rhyme scheme and he's got a boner for Keats. What do you mean, cutting back coffee?" She paused, obviously catching up, and asked overly casual, "You feeling sick?"

"Having a flare-up, I think," Grantaire grunted, pouring himself some off-brand frosted flakes. There were three boxes of milk in the fridge, every one of their labels in Arabic. "Can you _please_ mark the skim when you buy it?" he whined over his shoulder in Feuilly's direction.

"Learn another language; broaden your horizons," Feuilly said drily, graciously letting him change the subject. "Speaking of language, Jean the lit student would probably go for you. I'll happily sell you off to him if you'll take your prattling elsewhere."

Grantaire often got the feeling that Feuilly would like him a lot more if they didn't live together.

"Tell me," Grantaire said, "does Jean write odes to the famous Enjolras?"

Feuilly smiled slowly. Grantaire began to worry.

"Enjolras, huh?" Feuilly said. Grantaire shrugged, smile turned self-deprecating.

"If I were Donatello, I'd carve her in marble. Or maybe in bronze, like his _David_. The good _David_, not his first one, that one is shitty." And it was true, he would. She'd been a sculpture in the night, something solid when there had been nothing in Grantaire's head but the image of black waves, black water. Whirlpools.

"I wondered how long it would take you to bring up Enjolras again. It does make sense," Feuilly said, tapping her chin.

"Okay, what the hell is that supposed to mean?" he asked tiredly, "Cause I can tell you right now I don't actually want to bang her. Or Jean, no offense to a guy I don't even know." His art rambling wasn't anything new; Feuilly had seen him go into a daze for an afternoon after he'd pictured their postman as a Klimt painting. Yet, Feuilly sighed at him the way that made Grantaire feel loud and oblivious and bumbling.

"I'm not going to gossip with you," she said, checking the time on her phone. It was a red Samsung with a strip of blue tape on it, because she and Grantaire had both bought the cheapest phones they could find and spent a month mixing them up before they gave in and marked them. "Instead, I'm off to work." She gave him a steady look, but her mouth quirked. "If you can't be good be careful."

"Yes Maman," he said, mouth still full of frosted cornflakes, standing to execute a crisp salute. She left, keys jangling, and Grantaire suddenly felt overwhelmed, even though he was alone in the apartment. He rushed to his room, slamming the door too hard without thinking and nearly knocked the glittery butterfly off its hook.

Grantaire meant to lie in his duvet nest and float away on the sick feeling; drift on the way exhaustion and a mouth still rank with the old scent of gin numbed his brain. And he did just that, for a while. The surprise came when he got up again.

It was only noon, and the sun was high over the valley. The white rock that showed through on sheer cliff faces on the distantly high peaks of the Belledonne surged hot and bright against the brown of the rest of the mountain. There were pockets of snow, too, growing like mold in the pits and shadows of the highest peaks.

He stumbled into the kitchen, barefoot on brown tile neither cool nor warm. He ate more cereal. He picked up the flyer to throw it in the bin, but got caught up trying to make sense of the design choices. It was a work of art in its own way, if by 'its own way' you meant it had matched the aesthetics of a nicely shaped puddle of dog piss.

Grantaire doodled DEAD REVOLUTIONARIES CLUB with a silver sharpie over the copy-paste google images and what had possibly once been the tricolor. Added some sparkles. Went back to his room to find body glitter as an addition, but gave up after a cursory search of his bedside table and returned to the kitchen with his phone instead. He forgot that he'd been considering pulling out a bottle of wine and going on a proper bender.

He forgot to not be curious.

**R (11:53):** this flyer rlly is shitty. but it mentions meeting. whr is meeting?  
**Feuilly (12:02):** ur face is shitty. dont try to sculpt eve-marie.  
**R (12:02):** no promises  
**Feuilly (12:04):** it's a café across from the Casino on the way to parc paul mistral  
**Feuilly (12:04):** nxt to boucherie  
**Feuilly (12:05):** ur not even a sculptor  
**R (12:24):** u dont no me u dont no my life  
[image attached]

And that was how Grantaire spent the next half hour cleaning up scattered paintbrushes and the broken remnants of his only remaining wine glass after his mixed media sculpture,"Self Portrait with Stolen Roses", self-destructed. It also happened to be to be a moment that, years later, would be one of the main contenders in a raging debate over the exact time and date at which Grantaire joined The Dead Revolutionaries Club.


End file.
